


You Jump, I Jump

by littlemissdarci



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood and Injury, Happy Ending, Hospitalization, Injury Recovery, Jaeger Pilots, Light Angst, M/M, Team Dynamics, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:48:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24010831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlemissdarci/pseuds/littlemissdarci
Summary: A good Ranger never leaves his co-pilot.A Pacific Rim AU where Tenzou is injured and Kakashi waits.
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi & Yamato | Tenzou, Hatake Kakashi/Yamato | Tenzou, Namiashi Raidou & Shiranui Genma
Comments: 14
Kudos: 59





	You Jump, I Jump

***

As it stands, he was lucky. The doctors are speaking over his shoulder in these hushed voices, soft and strained. Without the drive suit to take the impact, the fall would have completely crushed him.

Tenzou’s prognosis remains undecided. His lungs have been cleared of water, his pulse and body temperature are dangerously low but steadily climbing. The main concern is that his consciousness seems to be wandering, it’s trapped in the drift after the sudden traumatic severance of their neural bridge. When Tenzou’s condition stabilizes and his brain activity begins to resume, they say he might able to breathe without a ventilator, but no further predictions can be made until full consciousness returns.

For all they know, that could be tomorrow, or it could be weeks.

Kakashi knows this is not Tenzou in the bed. Tenzou isn’t in the broken body with an oxygen mask strapped tight over the mouth to move the air in and out of the lungs.

Kakashi swallows hard and squeezes his eyes closed. He can still taste the laughter in his smile. The one that echoes bright like bells through the walls of the Shatterdome.

He imagines the light that seems to shine in every room he’s ever seen Tenzou enter, golden and alive and more beautiful than the dawn, and when Kakashi opens his eyes to the cold fluorescence of the white bulbs built into the ceiling of the medical bay, it’s all he can do not to shove his face against the bedsheets and scream, _come back, come back, come back_ —

***

The night Tenzou moves from the trainee barracks and into his official Rangers’ quarters, he finds Kakashi already sprawled across the bottom bunk. His head is cradled in the crook of an arm and his foot hangs over the edge, swinging back and forth lazily as he pinches the edges of the Icha-Icha novel between his fingers.

“Yo.”

“Hello Senpai.” Tenzou’s hand comes up to rub at the back of his neck, “I see you’ve made yourself comfortable.”

“Sure did.” Kakashi flips and stretches, eyes shut, his back arching catlike against the pillows. “You don’t mind taking the top, do you?”

“Not at all.” Tenzou says as he strides across the room to the dresser, moving to unpack his bag. “Topping you will be fun.”

He drops the Icha-Icha and lets it fall to the floor loudly. Kakashi’s bloodstream starts surging up and into his head and he turns red, sputtering.

“-Kakashi-senpai?”

It’s common sense, but it’s a maddeningly slow few seconds before he realizes Tenzou meant the top bunk.

***

On the fourth day Kakashi pulls open the door and it’s Raidou who startles out of his chair. He doesn’t relax when their eyes meet and the recognition registers. Instead, his face armors up and he ducks his head down as he turns back toward the bed.

They stand there a minute, two minutes, frozen as statues.

“I called it wrong.”

Kakashi can’t tell if the words are meant for him or for Tenzou. Maybe Raidou’s simply speaking them aloud for emphasis, to hear himself say them.

“This is all my fault.”

_It’s not,_ Kakashi wants to say. He knows it’s what he should say— _we’re a team, no one could have predicted this_ —but his gaze strays over Raidou’s head to where Tenzou lies, so still and pale, and the statement catches at the back of his throat.

Raidou doesn’t seem to be waiting for an answer. He stretches out his hand; his knuckles brush against the slope of Tenzou’s cheekbone, down his face, the touch slow and too tender for this world.

“Come back soon, bud.” he murmurs, so quiet it nearly disappears beneath the electronic blip of the heart monitor. “I miss our talks.”

He’s gone before Kakashi even realizes he’s left the room. There’s only the faintest stirring in the air as he passes, the door sliding shut soundlessly behind him.

***

Tenzou is broken, laid out flat on the floor of the hangar. Tenzou’s arms and legs slack, blood splattered across his forehead and caked down the side of his face.

Shizune is bent over Tenzou, both hands braced against his chest, throwing all her weight into the downward push.

_It should be impossible for Kakashi to see it from where he sits, slumped on the floor of the wrecked Conn-Pod. It should be impossible to hear these things from that high up. Later, doctors will tell him he imagined the whole thing._

“No, please. Tenzou, _no_.” Shizune’s face comes away red with tears. Thirty more chest compressions. Two more rescue breaths. “Come on—”

Finally, the rest of the medical team arrives.

_Kakashi’s a Ranger. A good Ranger never leaves his co-pilot._

The boot falls are heavy above him and the world shakes, tilts off balance. It’s Genma dropping down the ladder and into what remains of the Conn-Pod. His friend’s arms are locked around his shoulders, crushing Kakashi to his chest.

It feels like drowning.

“Don’t look.” Genma’s speaking and it’s like a thousand razor blades against his ear. “ _Fucking hell_. Kakashi, don’t look.” his voice breaks.

He’s too far away. Tenzou is so far away and Kakashi can barely feel him anymore.

***

When the lead engineer, Shikaku, leads them into the hangar to meet Striker Aurora for the first time, there’s no need to ask which one she is. They already know as soon as they see her. She’s the tall, sleek machine standing straight as a prima ballerina on the far side of the room, all looping silver decals painted a rich indigo blue. She’s slender for a fighting mech and looks light on her feet—but what she lacks in the heavy armor and artillery department, she more than makes up for with a cut response time and maneuverability that’s second to none. She’s their fastest Jaeger or, so they’ve been told.

Their eyes fall on her and the connection is instantaneous, as synergetic as though it comes from within the drift itself. _That’s our girl_. Kakashi feels it in his bones and there’s a corresponding shift in the way he breathes as he gazes up at her in wonder.

“Aurora.” Tenzou’s beaming, shading his eyes with one hand, rising up on toes to try and see all the way to the crown of her head. “That means dawn, you know.”

_Dawn_. And something hot and sun-bright is rising in the hollow of Kakashi’s chest, some feeling he can’t conceive a name for, even as it spreads through him all the way down to the tips of his fingers.

“I love her already.”

***

“Sorry about your girl.”

For someone who tends to barrel through life with all the subtlety of a hurricane, Maito Gai is a surprisingly quiet walker. Kakashi doesn’t even notice him until the catwalk beneath his feet sways. “Leave her to Shikaku-san and the boys. They’ll have her good as new.”

On the ground below them the man directs his phalanx of mechanics as decisively as a general sending troops into battle. Kakashi wonders if looking at Striker Aurora hurts Shikaku as much as it does himself. The shining metal of her is crumpled and lacerated all up the left side, the arm half-twisted where it joins the shoulder, the Conn-Pod compartment ripped in half. He looks at her and feels his chest constrict.

This is the ninth day now. Kakashi wonders how many days away “good as new” is. He considers apologizing—Gai and Asuma must be pulling double duty since Aurora’s out of commission with one of her pilots suspended from duty and the other in the ICU half-alive.

“I know,” is all he says in the end. “I know they will.”

Gai’s mouth opens, then closes again. Opens, closes. He looks like he wants to say something more but instead he stops, glancing down at the docking bay.

“Kakashi!” His head snaps with surprising force, and Kakashi nearly takes a step back. “We will ride together one day. Clear the path for our youth!”

***

_Transmission from Mission Control to Brave Luna_ , crackling to life over the comm: _Are you positive he’s alive?_

“No.” Genma says, wound tight, muscles tensed, ready to spring at a moment’s notice. “But with all due respect, Marshal, I’ve got Hatake here about ready to hurl himself into the Pacific and find Tenz himself. So, are you going to let us get our boy, or do you want _two_ of your best pilots drowned?”

“Jesus Christ. Genma.” The alarms are singing behind Hiruzen, mechanical chorus of voices trying to articulate that there are other kinds of danger headed their way. “If you meet any more trouble out there after that fight with the category four—”

“-I’ll take full responsibility,” A low exhalation as Genma breathes out into the comm, “we’re not coming back without him.”

Everything he says is so clear-cut, confident. He’s sure about this.

“I’ve got a read.” First Officer Inoichi says, curt and clipped. “We’re sending you the birds. Debris surfacing at nine o’clock. Bring him home.”

“Roger that.”

Brave Luna is bending at the waist, one of her massive hands reaching down, probing the water as delicately as she can with Genma, muttering under his breath, “C’mon, Tenz. Hang on buddy. There you are. We got you.”

***

Kakashi hasn’t had a proper drift partner in over two years. There was no one who could keep up with him, not since Obito.

Until one day Hiruzen calls him into his office, “There’s this trainee—You should see him dance.”

_Dance_ is really the only word to describe it. Tenzou is graceful and controlled yet strong. He matches his opponents’ step for step—retreating, then advancing, every thrust and parry calculated and perfectly timed. If aptitude in the kwoon room is any indication of drift compatibility, Tenzou could probably drift with just about anyone.

Today, up against veteran Ranger, Hatake Kakashi, he seems most in his element.

There’s a fierceness to his movements against Kakashi, a spirit that’s not quite present against anyone else. They move in perfect synchronization. Kakashi’s certain no two people have ever smiled at each other as much as they do when sparring.

It ends with Kakashi landing flat on his back. He sits up in genuine surprise, leaning back on his elbows, flushed and breathless, having literally been knocked off his feet. Tenzou’s hunched over, looking a little sore himself, but he’s laughing as he extends Kakashi a friendly hand to pull him up.

For a second, the veteran Ranger forgets that everyone here is preparing to be sent into battle. But slowly, he begins to feel at ease the moment it dawns on him, the familiar ray of sunshine gleaming in his new co-pilot’s grin.

***

He is untouched until suddenly, he feels his entire body awash with a cold liquid terror and his eyes and mouth sting with salt and he can’t breathe-

Tenzou is plunging down, down into the depths where nothing can follow him, while above the surface in the land of the living, the category four writhes and twists around the blade of Aurora’s sword.

Somehow the rage is enough to move him—he shouldn’t even be able to think, but bright red spots bloom at the edges of his vision and Kakashi moves, every muscle screeching with the effort to reel the weapon backward and slam Aurora’s knee into the joint between its armor plates, bending back the beast’s spine.

Under the sound of splintering bone and the deafening wail of the kaiju, the comm crackles as Brave Luna comes awake again: “Get clear, Aurora. We’ve got you.”

As one, Genma and Raidou hurdle forward, cannons locked on to the belly, homing in on the vulnerable flesh. Kakashi releases the sword and throws all his strength into pitching Aurora sideways out of the line of fire as the rally comes—three, four shots, blowing the serpentine body apart. He is untouched, but he still can’t breathe, every nerve in his body alight and burning.

***

“You’re so focused in battle.” Tenzou tells him as the techs strip them down in the drivesuit room after their second solo kill. His eyes are soft, wistful. Kakashi doesn’t think he’s ever seen those eyes on a soldier before and he’s pretty sure he never will again.

“You mean _we_ ,” Kakashi points out, cocking an eyebrow. “We’re one in the same out there. You’re in my head, I’m in yours.”

“Maybe, but you make the final calls and no one’s quicker on the uptake than you.”

The praise has Kakashi ducking his head down, fiddling with his straps and pointedly not looking at his kouhai.

“I think you could be Marshal one day.”

“Hiruzen won’t give up his post until the war is good and over.” Kakashi chuckles, forces down the feathery sensation curling suddenly in the pit of his stomach. “Besides, I couldn’t.”

“Of course you can.” Tenzou insists, turns those soft, steady eyes upon Kakashi. “You can do anything.”

***

Kakashi’s certain he can find everything he needs in life projected on the monitors next to Tenzou’s bed. Everything begins and ends with his hands cupped around Tenzou’s face, their foreheads pressed together as if it’s the proximity that keeps them breathing.

The doctors say Tenzou’s vital signs are growing stronger by the day. _He’s fighting,_ they tell him. He could wake up any day now.

_Of course he’s fighting_ , Kakashi thinks. He closes his eyes and reaches for Tenzou. _He’s the best fighter I know._

_You need to wake up_ , he thinks, and even if they’re not hooked into the hardware there’s a stirring at the fringes of his mind that reminds him of the drift. He’s reaching for Tenzou in the colorless not-light of their two minds, casting his net outward and waiting. The truth is that, for better or for worse, Tenzou is the one he’s meant to die with. _I can’t do this without you._

A good Ranger never leaves his co-pilot.

Kakashi’s head knows this. His heart knows it too.

***

There isn’t time to say anything when the kaiju twists around to face them. No time to shout for assistance as the horn saws like a knife through the Conn-Pod and Aurora pitches dangerously to one side, nearly going down on one knee.

Then, the left half rips free, scattering in the air in a shower of wire and glass and twisted steel.

Kakashi can see the sky through the hole that’s been carved out next to him, can see the waves frothing all around them and the red and yellow lights that mark the Shatterdome. He thinks it could be a trick of the light, the gleaming light of Tenzou’s drivesuit amongst the debris hurtling down to the surf, and this can’t be real. Tenzou loves the sea. Tenzou’s at home in the water-

***

Kakashi finds him paddling near the shore. When Kakashi calls to him he goes under, surfacing again a moment later with his back to the rising sun.

“Water’s perfect!” The morning sky is pale blue and clear, and the breeze lifts his words and carries them gently to Kakashi who’s digging the heels of his boots into the sand. “Come in, Senpai!”

He sounds so at home and the water certainly looks nice from here, smooth and turquoise blue, shimmering all the way to the horizon. It doesn’t look like the same ocean the kaiju rise from. It’s not the same water that Kakashi’s seen black and angry and roiling during lightning storms. He almost can’t reconcile it. He doesn’t know how it’s even possible, but then again everything Tenzou touches seems to come away with a brightness to it.

“I think I’ll watch you from here.” He kicks the sand at his feet for emphasis, and in response Tenzou shakes his head, mock-incredulous, “Okay. But you’re seriously missing out.”

“Just be careful out there.” Kakashi warns. “Don’t make me come save you.”

His kouhai scoffs, “I’m from a fishing town, Kakashi-senpai. I’ve been swimming since before I could walk.”

***

They don’t realize it right away, but the sound, shrill cacophony of screeching and ripping flesh and claws scraping against metal, is the beast losing its arm. The kaiju arches its back, twists its body around and the arm releases from Brave Luna’s grip with a sick crunch and a thick spurt of kaiju blue, jarring her side. Raidou cries out in pain and they can hear his voice filled with panic over the comm, and Brave Luna stalls, their drift shaken by it.

“Raidou! Shit, stay with me, Raidou!” Genma’s voice swells, cracks. “Aurora, cover!”

Tenzou’s tanned skin has paled from exhaustion, his hair matted with sweat across his forehead. He wets his lips, breathes out, and then he’s smiling again.

“May we have this dance?” he says, light and easy, loud enough for the words to skid across the comm to Brave Luna’s Conn-Pod, and all the way home to Mission Control. They’re for Kakashi, but mostly he says them for Raidou and Genma.

At that, Aurora’s arm comes up, sword in hand, and she lets it fly.

***

Kakashi knows a thing or two about orbits, and that’s what it feels like every time he steps into the drift. The pull of the void, the negotiation nearly a dance, we spin around each other, I break from you, you pull me back, we hold each other steady.

It should be unlawful for it to be this easy. It wasn’t anything like this with Obito. But when he and Tenzou slip into each other’s heads it’s no less than a key finally sliding into its lock.

When Kakashi looks at him he doesn’t think about dying. He doesn’t think about the end of the world. All he knows is on the last day of this hell, at the end of this war, when dawn hits the horizon they will run down to the beach and swim under the rising light of a new day.

Tenzou is important to him. His kouhai is the cornerstone of all his dreams. But that’s not all. That’s not nearly enough to explain it. Kakashi can’t get his tongue around the right words. He doesn’t know quite how to say it yet.

“I’m putting my trust in you.” Kakashi tells him softly as they suit up.

A bond of trust between co-pilots is necessary for the neural handshake to succeed. His gaze falls across the Conn-Pod to where Tenzou’s hooked in beside him, and his heart quickens with something more than just battle-nerves.

“What’s that line?” Tenzou’s voice echoes from inside his helmet, but there’s no mistaking the smile. Kakashi thinks sometimes, he’d know it even from deep beneath the depths of the sea.

“Oh! That’s right. You jump, I jump.”

_You jump, I jump._

_I’d do anything for you,_ he wants to say. But that sounds way too sentimental coming out of his mouth. God forbid the veteran Ranger Hatake Kakashi do something like uncover too much of his heart. So instead he says, _“Right,”_ and hopes it means the same thing.

***

Brave Luna takes the lead when they’re out on the water, but they aren’t searching long—the kaiju surges up out of the waves to meet them, looking for all the world like it’s about to swallow the moon. It collides with Luna’s chest, claws scraping, her huge steels hands coming up to dig clawed fingers into its sides. They grapple and it appears for a moment like it’s going to manage to push her backward under the water until Aurora flanks her, throwing punch after punch until the kaiju falls back and ducks back under the water with a cry, twisting its tail toward Aurora’s legs.

She sidesteps, dancing, and Genma lets out an appreciative whistle. “What a beauty, your Aurora. Look at your girl move. I guess that makes us the ugly step-sister huh, Raidou?”

“Speak for yourself,” Raidou snaps. They can nearly hear his eyes rolling all the way to the back of his head. “I’m picking up on a weak spot by its side. Try to get a grip on it while Aurora goes for the front.”

“Roger. Copy that, little sister?”

“Copy.” Kakashi says. “We’ll follow you. Age before beauty.”

***

Dr. Tsunade tells Kakashi that it won’t be over, if— _when_ , she corrects, Tenzou wakes up. He could emerge from this comatose state with a variety of impairments: amnesia, limited mobility, loss of sight or speech.

“Whatever happens,” Kakashi says, “I’ll be with him.”

Tsunade sighs long and hard. Her shoulders slump under her white coat, bearing down under an immense, invisible weight. “Hatake, you have to know he may never recover to his pre-injury level of functioning. Complete recoveries are rare. Even when the prognosis is good he might need _months_ , _years,_ of intensive rehabilitative therapy. You can’t possibly be there for him through all that—"

“I’ll be with him.” He repeats, voice full of conviction. His eyes never leave Tenzou’s face when he says, “Anything for him.”

***

“All right, boys, we’re looking at a Category Four.” Hiruzen says. An image shimmers to life on the monitors in front of them—it has a horned head, four spindly legs sprouting from a long snakelike body, wicked spikes studded all along the spine.

“Sighted at 0400 hours. Heavily armored all along its dorsal side. Aggressive and quick in the water. Be careful.”

Inoichi cuts in, “Aurora, you’ll wing for Luna. Immobilize it so she can get a clean shot for the final blow. You should be able to match it for speed.”

“Understood,” Kakashi says. “We’ll make a dance of it.”

A shrill, thin sound over the comm is Genma drawing in a whistling breath. “A dance under the stars? Sounds kind of romantic of you, Kakashi.”

A long-suffering sigh from Raidou, “ _Genma,_ shut up _,”_ has Kakashi trading a knowing smirk with Tenzou across the Conn-Pod. “Aurora, when we get out there, we’ll draw the offense and you follow. Let’s start with that until I have a better idea of how it moves. Is that alright with you guys?”

“We trust you.” Tenzou directs to Raidou, _fond_ , and the silence on the other end of the transmission means Raidou’s flustered and probably dropped his eyes back to the diagnostic screens, pretending to be preoccupied with drawing up a proper strategy.

***

The morning breaks rainy and the only other person waiting for the bus to the Tokyo Shatterdome is a tanned male in a forest green windbreaker. He’s got earphones and he’s smiling down at the wet ground as he taps his feet to the beat of some song Kakashi can’t hear, but he turns his head the moment he notices the presence next to him on the bench.

“Good Morning,” he says, popping out one earbud with a grin that looks to Kakashi like the only glimpse of sun he’ll get on this overcast day. “You headed to the base too?”

“Yep.” Kakashi answers, and the person immediately shoots up from his seat to bow low and polite. “I just transferred. Name’s Yamato Tenzou, from Tottori, Ranger-in-training. Nice to meet you.”

Kakashi doesn’t anticipate the punch that lands squarely in the center of his chest following the introduction, knocking out whatever wind Tenzou’s smile didn’t already catch. It’s all Kakashi can do not to double over, hands clutching at the spot where his heart should be.

“Hatake Kakashi. Uhh, I’ve been here a while. Former pilot, _Ranger_.” He nods in return.

He extends a hand to shake, blinks in surprise when he finds the returning grip surprisingly firm, the fingers curled around his own cool and strong. Another grin, another flash of honest-to-god brilliant sunlight when Tenzou says, “Oh! Well in that case, it looks like I should be calling you, Senpai.”

***

On the morning of the thirty-first day, Kakashi steps out of their room and Raidou crashes into him throwing him back against the door. He can see Raidou’s eyes wide and wet, his mouth moving soundlessly, and there’s an ache that blooms in Kakashi’s ribs because he knows what this is about.

Raidou’s immediately righting himself and pulling at his arm—Raidou, who for the past month hasn’t been able to look in Kakashi’s direction without recoiling, is taking off at full sprint to the medical bay. Suddenly, all he can do is suck in his breath as he throws his feet harder against the ground to keep up.

Doctors are surrounded by the bed when they reach Tenzou’s room. Tsunade is checking the wiring on the heart monitor and Shizune has her eyes trained on the ventilator. But all of Kakashi zeroes in on the way Tenzou’s eyelids blink open and close again and again.

He’s too focused watching Tenzou draw in a breath, deep and strong, all the way down to the pit of his chest on his own. Tenzou’s lashes flutter and Kakashi nearly bursts into tears right there because he’d been so afraid he’d never see those warm eyes again, that he’d lost them to the cold inky blackness of the sea.

He can feel his breath rattling in his chest with every inhale and he’s in too deep. He knows now, that important thing he has to say to Tenzou. He finally has the words.

They’re something that marginally have to do with how well they drift together, but mostly about how much he loves him _._ The words stick in the back of his throat and all that comes out instead is a strangled, broken sound as he crumples onto the floor next to the bed.

Tenzou’s eyes are wide open and Kakashi’s so scared they’re going to snap shut again. But instead they stay open, struggling to focus against the harshness of the lights until they land on Kakashi. Then, those lips curve into a familiar smile and finally, they move. His voice isn’t quite back yet but Kakashi’s memorized the shape of Tenzou’s mouth around every word they know, smiling and not.

“You jump, I jump-” Tenzou rasps. “-Right?”

He knows this is real, not a dream, not a hiccup in the drift. He knows because nothing is more real than Tenzou’s breath ghosting against his face, rays of sunlight across an ocean. He’s here, golden and alive and more beautiful than the dawn.

Kakashi's sobbing when he drops his lips to the top of Tenzou’s, “You jump, I jump.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was loosely inspired by the "You jump, I jump." line in the Titanic. 
> 
> I never planned to write a Pacific Rim AU until I noticed there are no Pacific Rim AU's of these two! Does the KakaYama/KakaTenz ship still exist? Well, in my world it's forever sailing~
> 
> Want more? I wrote a break-up fic of them [Here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14483391)
> 
> Thank you for reading!


End file.
